Improvements found at Taunton and Somerset

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has reported improvement in the quality of services for patients at Taunton and Somerset NHS Foundation Trust following its latest inspection.

The CQC visited Musgrove Park Hospital unannounced in August to check the quality of four core services: urgent and emergency care, surgery, end of life care and outpatients. The ratings for urgent and emergency services and end of life care have consequently been upgraded to Good, while surgery and outpatients were also rated Good.

Specifically, the inspectorate found that end of life care had improved in the delivery of the service and outcomes for people, that there had been significant improvements in the emergency department, particularly around paediatric nursing, and that action had been taken to resolve issues with theatre safety and surgical site infections in surgery.

Professor Ted Baker, Chief Inspector of Hospitals, said: “Musgrove Park Hospital continues to provide a Good service to the people of Taunton and Somerset, with services rated Outstanding for caring. I am pleased that during this inspection we have been able to record improvements in some important services – notably with better outcomes for patients in the emergency department and end of life care.

“Overall we have found the trust to be well led, with a dedicated management team who understood the challenges the organisation faced and were committed to sustainable care that extended beyond the borders of the hospital. The trust needs to focus on patient safety, where we require further improvements. We will continue to monitor the trust’s performance and we will return in due course to check on further progress.”

Peter Lewis, joint chief executive at Musgrove Park Hospital and Somerset Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We are very pleased that the CQC has assessed the care given by our staff at Musgrove Park Hospital as ‘Outstanding’, and our hospital as ‘Good’ overall. This is testimony to the efforts of our very hard working, talented staff.

“We are also pleased that the CQC has recognised that since our last inspection in 2016 we have made a number of improvements across the hospital, which has resulted in higher ratings for our emergency department (A&E), surgery and end of life care. As part of the CQC’s new inspection arrangements the CQC inspectors also rated the leadership of the hospital as Good.